"I always thought that making suicide a crime was the most foolish of laws. "
Actually, there IS method to this particular madness:
As suicide is a crime, there has to be a criminal investigation, which may turn up evidence that what looked like a suicide wasn't actually one, or (more often) the individual in question was driven to suicide, prompting further criminal investigation.
Also, insurance companies would pitch all kinds of fits (which I think they should be made to do more often) if something that causes them losses are not made a crime. :P

I always thought that making suicide a crime was the most foolish of laws. If suicide does occur, then there is no one to prosecute. If it doesn't occur, then there is no crime. Do it your self methods increase the risk of failure, are frequently messy and unpleasant for the folks who have to clean up afterward, waste otherwise useful material and require a certain level of physical vigor to enact. Forcing non-believers to follow the practices of any religion is evil in its purest form.

Allowing the hopelessly terminally ill to choose to end their suffering and pain is not only the right and moral thing to do, but also takes some financial pressure off the cost of a nation's medical bill, in removing the expenses attached to the futile effort to prolong the life of a person who does not want it prolonged.

The Catholic/Christian answer to someone in extreme pain who wants to end it is:
"According to the Bible you must suffer in order to be saved."
Someone who wants to help another in extreme pain to end his/her life is told, "It is immoral and illegal to end or help end a life. You can't do it."

Thus, a person whose religion does not demand suffering is required to undergo excruciating suffering because of someone else's belief system.

What a horrible misrepresentation of Christianity. While we can all grow and learn through hardship and suffering, it is not a requirement for salvation. Read the bible and maybe some Aquinas and Augustine and you'll find philisophically sound, reasonable ideas concerning death, suffering and even the value of all human life.

There are good and smart people on both sides of this discussion. No need to oversimplify and denegrate either.

Then what, pray tell, is the Christian/Catholic opposition to death with dignity based on? If people who don't share your religious opposition to voluntary termination [and a majority of people on the planet are not members of the Abrahamic faiths], wish to end their suffering, what gives you the right to tell them "No, continue to suffer?"

Surely you know of the Bible passages that suggest that suffering will be repaid in heaven, etc. Surely you also know that in the Dark Ages people were tortured to death under the belief that extreme agony would lead them to repent in extremis and thus be "saved."

Those "saved" by this barbaric means were not only pagans, but Christians who happened to disagree with the official dogma. You may wish to read up on the "auto da fe" and the fate of the Albigensians. Don't tell me to read the Bible [I have thank you] when you continue to apply whitewash over the crimes of the past.

No group's religious dogma has any place dictating to others in our secular republic, the constitution of which guarantees freedom of religion to all [and freedom from YOUR religion in particular].

I don't object to people holding negative views about gays, same-sex marriage, atheists, red-haired left-handed people, vegetarians, etc. What I object to is people trying to force their beliefs on others because "We know that this is the truth, the only truth and everyone must accept it!"

Stupidity and prejudice can not be easily gotten rid of, but it can be kept out of the public square. Those who would deny people choice regarding their own bodies, choice in bedroom activities, and choice in end-of-life decisions are nothing less than jackbooted religious brown shirts. They have a right to their beliefs and to live by them, but they deserve to have their noses rubbed in their errors until they leave others alone.

Almost all law involves the "forcing of a moral belief" on another group of people. You can't speed, rape, steal or do other illegal activities because a court, congress and a constitution grant and preserve rights of individuals.

We can and apparently do disagree because of our personal moral beliefs. If you believe in the three "rights" you espouse, you have every legal right to promote your beliefs. Me trying to keep your beliefs out of the public square would only be a reflection of narrow-minded fear.

Allow and promote civil discourse and don't be afraid to share your beliefs. And for the record, the jackbooted brownshirts you callously reference, killed 7 million jews and 1 million Christians. Hitler and his thugs were the most anti-religious rulers in recent history (although many rival them). All of those governments started their reigns of terror by limiting public discourse and silencing voices of opposition.

So if you believe in giving a doctor the right to end a life, I support your right to support their right. Don't be afraid of honest disagreement. I have seen people euthanized in Holland without their consent and I have seen people with disabilities targeted in that country (and in China).

I trust that your motives are sincere and hope that someday you will see that some who disagree with you are equally informed and sincere. Now go smile and hug someone!

You are presuming that exceptions prove the rule. What percentages of euthanasia in Holland were forced or not in accordance with the will of the person involved? Your assumption that allowing people in pain to terminate their lives [with adequate regulations to prevent abuse] in democratic countries is equivalent to mass violations of rights in nondemocratic and totalitarian countries is mind boggling.

I do not wish to control the lives of fundamentalists in any way, other than preventing them from violating the constitution by imposing their beliefs on others. Do you see the point? Do you understand that, no matter how firmly you believe in your religious principles, you have no right to impose them on others? There is a good point, a humane and Christian one, in wanting to prevent forced suicide.

Note "forced." In the right to terminate life, who is forcing whom? Nobody is forcing believers to go in for euthanasia, but believers are forcing people who are not believers to forgo what they see as release from pain and suffering. So, who is forcing and who is being forced?

Do you understand the principle that someone who does not believe in your religious principles [a Japanese Shinto believer, for example], and who is suffering in a terminal state [and does not believe in your miracles] and who wishes to end his life in peace, dignity and absence of pain, has every right to expect that you will not interfere?

I do not believe that you understand these principles. I hope that someday you will begin to understand them. Peace.

I appreciate your change in tone and your willingness to dialogue. For me, while the exceptions are important, they are not the root of my concerns. This isn't a religous discussion either (for me at least).

I work to stop human trafficking and educate young people about depression and suicide. Both issues are dear to me because I deeply value all human life. When pimps in Thailand tell us to stay out of their business and stop moralizing, I look at the coercion, addiction and even kidnapping that drives young women into that life. I believe in the value of their lives and I believe in placing the human before the economic. I have a feeling that you would be right there with me in wanting to help those young women and men.

As the same principle relates to suicide, if it becomes a sanctioned and legal choice, history seems to suggest that it will even be promoted (as is has in some of the comments posted here) as a responsible choice, morally AND economically. In some jurisdictions, the government is given the legal right to determine whether someone lives or dies.

I also worry, as do many of my fellow educators, that we are seeing a shift in thinking on other forms of suicide. Are you willing to deny the right of a 16 year-old who is depressed? Most are but it scares me that some are already conceding that even the young have the "right to die". I know that might seem like an exception, but almost all suicidal people I work with, speak later about the fog and sense of hopelessness that they were experiencing.

In the case of a terminally ill patient, we have made such huge leaps in pain management and the quality of hospice care that I can foresee a time when the examples you give will be addressed without the longing for death.

I met a woman recently who lives in Oregon. She was offered 100% health coverage for euthanasia but had her request for cancer treatment coverage rejected. I believe that we're already seeing the economic trump the human. I really hope that I'm wrong.

BTW, I am also against war and the death penalty. I bet we have several views in common and I look forward to engaging you in the public square again. I believe that you mean equally well and that this kind of dialogue is much more valuable than the name calling others on both sides are stuck in.

Thanks for the compliment, but it was undeserved. I did not change my tone, I explained the reason for it and this clarified the position. To have been absolutely clear at first would have been better.

You are correct that I would oppose human trafficking, slavery and allowing young people who are depressed to ask for euthanasia. The overriding concerns should be first do no harm and second do not infringe human rights. There is a problem in that humans sometimes create situations in which the two are, or seem to be, in conflict.

As to medication, some cancer medications, for example, affect some people in very disturbing ways. I have read that two medications that would help without the disturbing side effects are not available. The reason they are not available is that they are considered immoral and the law to ban them is supported by the religious right.

One of those is Marijuana. Legalization though it would help people who are suffering, MIGHT have negative social consequences. There are two problems with this, the problems are potential but the relief would be real. The ban is almost totally ineffective and only makes it impossible for people to do legally what millions do illegally every day. This is absurd. If possible I would legalize only for medical purposes.

Prostitution is a serious problem. It is only legal in one state, Nevada, where, as I understand it it is supervised and controlled. It is legal in the Netherlands, where the same restrictions are in place. In theory, an adult should be able to make the decision to be a porn star or prostitute, and be able to benefit from that. In fact, as you say, there is often some kind of force. The force might be criminals, poverty, and sometimes even the family selling a child into the practice.

A complete ban on prostitution [which has always and everywhere been ineffective] would save many, but deprive a few of their individual rights. [While traffickers have no right, the right to use of ones own body, with no harm to others does exist.] This is what I referred to above.

The area in which we seem to disagree is that in most cases the rights of the individual are paramount [this is typical American thinking]. If a person is suffering and near the end of life, and there will be no harm to others from self termination, then the individual right must prevail. It is certainly an unconstitutional infringement of the individual's rights to prevent it because it violates someone else's religion.

I guess that, despite your perfect English, you are not American. I took your position to be that of the American religious right. They would violate the Constitution of the US by putting their religious notions into law, and subject everyone to the tyranny of their archaic and often non-humanitarian religious beliefs.

This is why my statements above were especially strong. I swore an oath to defend the Constitution against "all enemies foreign and domestic," and those who would violate the separation of church and state and the right to freedom of religion for others are most definitely enemies of the Constitution.

Fascinating insights. First, as to your guess, I am an American but have lived most of my life in Canada. I see many policies in practise here that would scare the religious right to death. i.e. Legalization of medical marijuana, ban on the death penalty, healthcare for everyone, etc. I have more arguments with the "religious right" than any other single group. I share some beliefs with people under that label but only because I have studied the issues. I also disagree with them on many issues.

While I do have faith, my faith does not conflict with science or reason and I am totally opposed to the idea of a theocracy. Most of my thoughtful Christian, Jewish and Muslim friends feel the same way. Religion in America has become so politicized that civil discourse is rare. People on both ends of the political spectrum feel obligated (in a totally well intentioned way) to protect the constitution from the other side. Somehow the founding fathers (and great women leaders of their time) were almost all devout Christians but knew that church and state could not become one institution. Their beliefs definitely helped form their opinions and beliefs but other voices were allowed in the discourse. It is an amazing country.

I would stand with you on so many issues and once we got to the actual potential solutions, people like us can change the world. Even when we disagree (like on euthanasia), we could agree on some aspects (like investing in better pain research, hospice care and medical marijuana). I find that Americans feel the need to hold beliefs in narrow pre-defined packages instead of studying them one-by-one. For example, if you are Republican, you "have to" be for the Iraq war and the death penalty and if you're a Democrat, you "have to" be for abortion without restrictions. All without most ever really studying those issues. That seems so unfortunate and counterproductive to me.

I think that many Americans suffer from an inadequate anthropology and have somehow succeeded without ever being introduced to philosophy, science, reason, art and classic literature. I'm not advanced on any of those but I respect the idea that my beliefs need to go deeper than ABC or Fox News want me to go.

I'm afraid our young people are in some trouble as a result. As gaming and porn addictions explode and corporate infused media prevails, we are looking at more judging and less real talking.

You and I are at least reversing that in a small way. Thank you for caring enough to get past the initial angst. It's not easy or often gratifying but it's always worthwhile in my opinion.

Agreed that we have got past the initial disagreement and into the areas where compromise or at least mutual tolerance can thrive. Yes the virtual civil war between the forces of theocracy and separation of church and state have poisoned the discourse. I could go into the beliefs of the founding fathers in a way that might surprise you.

Read the Jefferson Bible, or Madison* or John Adams* on the foundation of the US and you will find that many of the most important of the founders held beliefs that the modern religious right would consider anathema to Christianity. [*I hesitate to re-post, but if you follow my trail of crumbs back to previous topics here you will find the references.]

I am grateful that I grew up and was educated in Massachusetts, that hotbed of Education and humanism. I am impressed that my school in the 1960s taught everyone to read and write, and most people were conversant with the basics of logical thinking and science. How badly have the schools in the rest of the country been performing?

Many years ago my mother was hospitalized and in a bad way with the doctor telling us, my sister and I, we had to "make some decisions." My sister was sleeping at the hospital and I had flown in from out-of-town and spent every waking moment there. This entailed mostly sitting in a room with dimmed lights, several spooking video monitors and the hushed tones of nurses. The atmosphere was funereal and I told my sister "We have to get out of here for a while."

We left the hospital and went to a brightly lit restaurant and sat talking for hours -- and everything looked different. In fact, what we said to one another was, in effect, "What the hell are we thinking!?" An intensive-care ward has about it an aura of awful solemnity that discretely lobbies one to think of pulling the plug. Leaving that environment was the best thing we could have done -- especially for Mom!

The second thing I did was call my priest. I did not want consolation but, rather, was looking to objectify our decision. I mean, I wanted to refer to a set of standards that did not involve how my sister and I felt or what the doctors recommended. I wanted a set of rules outside all of us against which our actions could be measured. My priest calmly advised the Church's position on any end of life situation and by de-personalizing the decision enabled me to place our situation within a larger moral and ethical context. I did not have to rely on how I felt or mindlessly succomb to the suave indifference of medical professionals.

Mom recovered and had a few more pretty good years.

My driver's license is marked "No" on whether I want to be an organ doner. The insidious hospital atmosphere can combine with a certain God-complex and to even those who love you to give up the fight on your behalf.

If they wish to be cremated, that's fine with me. For all I care they can have themselves stuffed and placed on exhibit in Explorers' Hall at the Museum of Natural History. My wife's opinion, though, is that cremation is the way for me to go -- "I can sprinkle the ashes on an icy sidewalk so you'll be useful for a change."

This is one of those vexed questions, where it is absolutely imperative, IMO, if a legally binding determination needs to be made, that the terminology is spelled out to the nth degree. (It seems significant to point out here that the Dutch legislation has been left deliberately vague. As I understand it, the doctor assisting a patient’s demise, by following a precise protocol, nevertheless remains wholly culpable for her actions, but is not prosecuted. A not entirely satisfactory, but workable, outcome.)
I think it is absolutely vital, that everybody, patient, family, nursing staff, friends and neighbours, clergy, auxiliaries, children, not only recognises privately what to say and what not to say, but that every stake-holder patiently articulate exactly what they mean by the words they use.

In fact, if you think about it, every word we use in association with “the end of life” needs to be explained, in detail. To everyone. And again. Over and over. The dictionary definition is of little use here. What is of the utmost importance here is that everyone, all those who are intimately and casually involved, professionally and familiarly (each case is unique), understands what each means, precisely, by the words we all, in any other context, so carelessly use every day.

I simply cannot emphasise this enough. It sounds terribly pedantic, I know. But the unbelievable and God-awful misunderstandings, that are just waiting to spring up out of a casual throw-away remark, particularly at moments of such high family drama, are legion. The highly specific meaning of everything that is said, to say nothing of what people often prefer, unwisely, to leave unsaid, is derived from multiple layers, consisting of such banalities as intention, expression, intonation, gesture, superstition, assumption, innuendo, social and cultural considerations, tradition and, of course, plain ignorance.

It always helps, I guess, to remember that we’ve all got it coming to us, one day. So, if you’re up for it, maybe write the script for your own curtain call, before you’ve lost the plot. They’ll thank you for it. Under their breath.

The other component of physician assisted suicide that is seldom discussed involves proscribing enough pain medication to effectively push a very sick patient over the edge. This many be a subtle part of the discussion between doctor and patient, or it may be the doctor's decision alone. Often, the dosage proscribed is what is needed to prevent suffering, so the doctor can justify it on humanitarian grounds, still knowing that it may prematurely end the patients life. Of course, there are some "pro-lifers" who wouldn't hesitate to prosecute such doctors, even knowing that patients will face extreme suffering with less medication. I just hope that by the time I face a terminal illness, explicit PAS is legal everywhere.

I agree with you so I have created a petition to legalize physician assisted suicide for those peopleif they want it. If I can get 150 signatures on the petition it will be put on the We The People government website. Then if it gets 100,000 votes the administration will consider it. Go to the URL http://wh.gov/HZsl to see the petition and vote on it.

This isn't the first time euthanasia has been discussed, or even implemented, in "democratic" America.

101 years ago, the hallowed Carnegie Institute was recommending euthanasia as one way to 'cleanse society' of 'unfit attributes', which would have included terminal illnesses.

And Doctor-assisted suicide was not exactly uncommon in the US either.

"For example, doctors at an institution in Lincoln, Illinois fed its incoming patients milk infected with tuberculosis (reasoning that genetically fit individuals would be resistant), resulting in 30-40% annual death rates. Other doctors practiced eugenicide through various forms of lethal neglect."

This Economist article focuses on one small subset of the larger question, but that larger question provides a useful context for a larger view of the moral, ethical and "democratic" values.

Readers might care to look at this brief article, and ask if it contains anything pertinent to this discussion:

Assisted suicide for consenting, terminally ill patients is a far cry from killing random undesirables. It isn't really suicide if you weren't interested in dying.
Does the US have a horrible history of forced sterilization, experimentation on disadvantaged populations, and maybe a ridiculous penal code? Yes. These are two different topics.

I believe that the right to death is far more important than even the right to life. If somebody kills you, you are just that - dead. If somebody can control when you are allowed to die, you are a slave, or a puppet. That's much worse.

This hits pretty close to home for me. Recently my mother, who is still relatively young, was diagnosed with a terminal illness. She begged me that should the pain become too great, to help her...and here words fail me; euthanize surely isn't the right word to use for your own mother. What to even say? But now not only am I caught up in the emotional rollercoaster that her entreaty brings - not to mention the general sadness, fear and other emotions that potentially or likely losing my mother to this disease entails - but the fact that should I attempt to honor her wishes, I could become a felon and seriously hamper the rest of my life. Sure would be nice to have a bit more sense around this issue.

OneAegis,
It won't be too many years in the future when I may face similar situation with my parents. I have given them air tickets to Hawaii this Autumn while they are still fit enough to make the trip, though it cost me $900 just for the fuel surcharges (IATA be thrice damned for not forcing airlines to revise their official rates based on $100/barrel oil.),
but my mother tells me she is afraid of not being fit enough to travel come November...

If only we had doctor assisted suicide and your mother made her wishes known to her doctor you would not be faced with such a difficult request. For this situation I have created a petition to legalize physician assisted suicide for the terminally ill or those with unbearable chronic pain. Go to the URL http://wh.gov/HZsl to see the petition and vote on it. If we can get 150 votes for it by April 27 it will be placed on the We The People government website. Then it will need 100,000 votes for the Obama administration to consider it.

Speaking of "dying with dignity", have a look at Dick Teresi's new book The Undead.

It discusses death, the relevant medical and legal practices, and the organ transplant industry, and it seems to have driven the organ transplant industry and some doctors spastic mad. Worth a read especially for organ donors.

Interesting to ponder how it tangles with the issues of doctor-assisted euthanasia.

This is why such conversations need to take place much earlier. Personally, I am inclined to not prolong my life with extraordinary measures, but rather would prefer to simply be made as comfortable and pain free as possible while letting nature take its course. Is this a form of self-inflicted death? I don't think so. We are all mortal, the only question is whether we choose to hasten our own mortality, try and put it off for as long as possible, or simply let clock wind down on its own accord.

I hesitate to comment on something that I think is intensely personal and beyond the scope of an unknown stranger, gawping on the sidewalk at the tragedy of others. But I do think there may be an inportant clue in what you wrote.

“This was all complicated by the fact that my friend thinks that his dad would have preferred to live, had his dad been in a mental state to have made the decision.”

What comes after the comma is the crucial distinction, “had his dad been …”

As I see it, given the little information an outsider has access to, your friend could not “kill his dad”, because the man he knew as his dad was no longer there. Ask your friend to think back ten, twenty, thirty years. Am I still the same person I was all those years ago?

Think about it. I wasn’t even present at my own birth. My body has replaced every cell in my body numerous times since I was a kid. And not only that. Who was I last year, if I did not know then what I know now? Momentous events radically change all of us. Before 9/11, I was a different person, I don’t know, just happier I guess, who would not have believed it possible, that what happened that bright dreadful morning could happen.

And all the other major dramas in each of our personal lives, including all the nice stuff, make us who we are today. Next year, I’ll be somebody else, with even less hair. What ultimately dies, or is prematurely extinguished, is what was left of us, on that day.

Of course your friend’s dad would have preferred to live, if he had been the dad who once was hale and hearty and enjoyed life … and was the person who could have preferred it. But he wasn’t. Not any more.

Also tune in for the Dutch film "Tod Nach Plan" ("Death With a Plan") viewable on YouTube in two parts. It's in Dutch (obviously), so you'll have to seek a workable translation or find subtitles elsewhere online.

It's about a man with bipolar disorder who seeks out PAS to end his mental suffering. Highly worth watching for insight into the supposed taboo of allowing the mentally ill to end their lives (which I support).

Part of the resistance to such legalization in the States is less cultural or religious than practical. Even if we recognize the existence of cases where we have no moral difficulty accepting physician assisted death, we may not be willing to legalize it because we may have difficulty in practice sorting out such cases from others where grandma was axed to speed an inheritance. This is a reasonable judgment that many States have made. It is much like the question of whether any defense of necessity is available for killing an innocent person. In some States, there is none. It’s not that those States haven’t thought through possible situations in which such a defense might be desirable. Rather, they have determined that actors in such situations should have the full weight of the law to restrain them, or that they won’t be able to sufficiently sort out cases of genuine necessity.

The post offers interesting quantitative evidence that, with appropriate safeguards, sorting out justified cases of physician assisted death may not be so hard.